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Monday, 28 April 2014

The great Peke challenge: Malachy or Prince?

The HBO Sports segment on show breeding last week rightly highlighted the Pekingese, Palacegarden Malachy, that won Westminster in 2012.

The Peke is known as "the little lion dog".

But as Scottie Westfall remarked on his Retrieverman blog: "...what was once a pretty hardy little dog is now a little lion trying to be a marmoset."

Debby Wong/Shutterstock

But you can find some much more normal-looking Pekes outside of the showring and the other day I stumbled on this pic, below. I thought this dog was such a breath of fresh air that I contacted the photographer, Karen Givens, who has kindly given me permission to use the pic.

The dog's name is Prince and he lives in Arkansas... a purebred Peke, although only his sire is registered.

If we promise to listen and not jump down your throats, could anyone in the Peke fancy tell me why they think that Malachy with his very flat face, large nose roll and stenotic nostrils is a better dog than Prince?

They're certainly better, but nothing like the wide open nostrils of my own dogs. I'd be curious to know whether the dog snores or not, and how well he copes in heat, and long walks - those would be the deciding factors. I never noticed stenotic nares until I read this blog.

Prince is certainly an improvement on the current show Pekes though. Although, they're so bad, pretty much anything would be an improvement...

I didn't realise Christopher and Jemima were spending time researching, campaigning and pouring time and energy into there activities (expecting nothing in return) for the sake of competitive interests and egos. The motivation for competitiveness in that regard is surely reserved for people who inhabit the show world ? Not the people who actually give a stuff about companion animal welfare.

If there's a score being kept, I'd venture to say that my own humble contribution to the dialogue is more of a footnote to the volley that Jemima has accomplished with PDE, most notably for crossing over from the insider dog-people circles to the general public and reaching a mass audience, let alone the actual response from the establishment.

When the history is being written about how the pedigree culture grew decadent and corrupt and what more circumspect minds did to right the course, the first chapter will be on Mark Derr and his "Politics of Dogs" piece from 1990. All of us owe a debt to that article and much of the work we've published is in some way derivative of that piece, and for good reason.

The second chapter will be on Pedigree Dogs Exposed. Let there be no doubt about that. Even though I began blogging on welfare and breeding ethics before PDE, as did others, nothing solidified the movement like PDE did and there will not be a contemporary criticism or analysis of the pedigree culture in the UK or USA that will not first reference the work done by Jemima.

This is a debt that simply can not be repaid or under-stated.

While I have been gleefully celebrating the HBO segment and crowing about my own contributions to it, make no mistake, it was Jemima Harrison that made that segment happen. Not only was the thrust of the piece inspired directly from PDE, Jemima is the reason they even contacted me (and several other Americans) in the first place and a non-trivial amount of the footage and content was provided by her.

From my own soap box, I can only hope that the arguments I make are good enough, accurate enough, and unimpeachable and that they can some day find their way into the hands of people who can use them in a manner like PDE... a platform that reaches a much greater audience than the hundreds or thousands that I reach. The message will need to reach hundreds OF thousands, and do so over and over again.

If there is a competition here, it's that the reason-based, fact-based, science-based arguments are even heard over the roar of the paranoia, the propaganda, and the status-quo culture in dog breeding and dog owning. In that regard we are all on the same team even when we have reservations or differences of opinion.

If there is a winner or a loser, it is certainly the health and well being of the dogs. That's why it's important that we win.

I really question anyone who is a claimed fan of what I write who would appear to be trolling here. I just can't figure out what the point of that is. Border-Wars and PDE will not be divided by some ego trip because we are aligned on behalf of the welfare of purebred dogs, all dogs, and guided by sound principles of Science. I can't imagine any of that changing, and it has nothing to do with numbers of comments or views and everything to do with the good message winning out over the lies and self-deception being served up in defense of the status quo.

Border Wars you are fantastic, a brilliant blog totally focused on the dog and it's well being clearly outlining the utterly dangerous game of politics that is played out in the pedigree dog World. Your last paragraph is beautifully precise, concise and painfully accurate. Whilst there are huge sums of untaxed money streams available to unscrupulous, mental human beings, pedigree dogs, horses, cats etc are in danger.

I have 2 Pekingese, the males sire was a pure Peke while his dam was a Shih Tzu cross Peke, the female is a pedigree Pekingese. The female has on going back issues, corrective surgery is a very real possibility. She has also had her stenotic nares widened & her soft palate shortened. She carries the hideously thick Pekingese coat - or at least she would if I allowed her to be in full coat at any time of the year other than winter. I will add that she is barely 3 years old.

My mixed male has bowed front legs, I believe he will have issues with arthritis earlier in life as a result but for now they don't slow him down one bit. His muzzle is longer like that on the 2nd Peke pictured, he does appear to have narrow nostrils but he snores very little & can exercise without any kind of heavy panting, he is leaps & bounds better than the purebred in that regard. I will still consider the surgery for him because I want him to be as comfortable as he can. He hasn't shown signs of any back issues & I think it relates to his being more square, more compact. I would be interested in seeing his spine X-rayed but so far there hasn't been any reason to.

His coat is much finer, more wirey than the females. He still has thick pants & a rough but it's what I would call moderate & easily managed. He is about 6 years old.

The 2nd Peke is a vast improvement to look at & if he's anything like my male health wise too.

Every fluff ball of a dog coming out of China is known as a lion dog, any size.

BTW its horrible what the Chinese are doing to a once quite decent shepherd type dog the Tibetan mastiff. Even worse these "lion dogs" sell for hundreds of thousands of Yuan locally encouraging yet more extremes in shape and hair. Their eyes have almost disappeared in "head roll" the mane bit.

If its not nose roll its head roll or cheek roll or some roll taking over the poor dogs head face and body. Are people mad. This same look in humans is considered horribly deformed or an unfortunate disease the elephant man look yet we are happy our dogs suffer the same fate???

River, when you add in the ATMA recently changed the AKC standard to call for a shorter muzzle, in combination with the fact the far fluffier "lion coats" regularly get picked over the normal coats in the show ring, I have this mental image of the TM turning into a giant breed Pek in a not to distant future, and it scares me!

Yes another landrace type facing ruination. Wouldn't be lovely to read a breed description that was true to the breed at least. "A Tibetan mastiff is a variable large livestock and homestead guardian breed type from the Tibetan plateau......."

Standards!

We had a lovely one near the closest MTR station from us where I picked up and dropped our house keeper. He looked like he had just wandered off the plateau. Building sites here in China get a few large dogs to guard the premises usually a mottled bunch of interesting but ferocious beats, he was one of a pack.

A big lovely TM type. Instead of guarding it used to escape and take long walks. Up through and under the huge busy concrete fly overs it went past the temple and to the school grounds where it would walk from the MTR with the kids to school, disappear in a vacant lot next to the school then take them back to the MTR when school ended before returning to his construction site.

It seemed to just love children, they used to greet it and ruffle its huge head.

It used to make me laugh it had such a serious studious expression, thinking intensely as it walked. A lovely soft light step for such a big boned rangy dog. So agile too it used to leap over the high railing into the vacant lot, gorgeous blond feathering its tail floating right up over its back. You could see he was wary but he didn't show it other than making himself extra large and tip toeing, he never made eye contact once with me. He only ever trotted when he had to, like cross the road, then continue this lovely delibrate walk.

Most often these dogs are abandoned, left behind after construction is completed and end up impounded and destroyed. So I tried following it three times but it would have none of it, it didn't like adults.

I could never get close, he would avoid me with such elegant grace, even offering him food made him jump up an embankment in one leap. It was very difficult too, it would drop down the sides of vast storm drains to vanish and magically appear in the middle of a six lane highway. I never could find how to get to the construction site a 30+ story housing estate that seemed most active at night.

Anyway I hope it survived, I wouldn't have minded at all if he had come and lived with us up in the hills we have such a large lovely garden. He had other plans though most definitely.

I've been showing dogs on and off for 30 years, and I'd definitely take Prince over Malachi. He looks the way Pekes are SUPPOSED to look. His nares look fine to me. Love his beautiful coat and expressive eyes, too.

Show versions of LOADS of little dogs are worse. French Bulldogs are even squatter and flatter faced in the show ring, pomeranians are tinier, all chihuahuas have that crazy apple cranium ( no deer chis need apply), etc.

Prince looks like he could go for walks, which is fine if you're a pet owner and enjoy walking your dog. If, however, you're a show-dog owner and you have lots of dogs, you don't want dogs that need to go for walks. You want dogs that find any kind of physical exertion so exhausting, that walks are out of the question. You want dogs that are content to spend their days in crates, so their excessive coats don't get tangled. This means you can have lots of dogs, without the hassle of having to look after them properly. Who has the time and energy to walk 20-dogs a day? Hardly anyone, but it's easy to keep 20-dogs in your house if they're crated all day, and only go outside in your specially-adapted garden thrice a day to toilet. That profuse coat means no one will ever be able to feel the soft muscle tone of your dog caused by this lack of exercise. You have to keep lots of dogs because winning in the ring is tricky and very few dogs end-up being good enough to do well, so you tend to accumulate dogs in the hope of getting the 'one'.

And by this time, you've been in the company of so many other people who think it's acceptable to breed dogs that can't breathe, and whose dogs also spend their lives in crates, that it all appears so completely normal. To you.

This is why the modern Pekes look the way they do, and why Prince will never become popular in the showring.

Must correct; one simply cannot be sure about purebredness unless both parents are registered. People can say, but they can _never be sure_. Anyway, I obviously prefer Prince's type thousand times over the general modern pekingese. Some people are just plain sick, breeding dogs who can't breathe.

I didn't think I liked pekes, and I want to take Prince home with me and give him cuddles. His face is expressive and his eyes look sweet and interested, where most of the show type pekes I've seen look a little bit panicked, like they've realized they can't walk that far without stopping to catch their breath, but the podium is still fifteen feet away.

Karen Givens, it appears, is a talented photographer. I agree with the direction of this post, and Malachy gives me the creeps, but it is a little unfair to compare a portrait photo to shutter stock. The eyes and flowing coat are what really catch my attention in the photo of Prince. That aspect owes a lot to lighting, and to having lighter colored eyes. In my own breed (Labradors) it always seems harder to get a good photo of a black dog than a yellow. I would not rush to laud Prince without seeing the dog move and knowing he was clear of heart defects, syringomyelia, etc.

Omg Jennifer.........we can see his eyes, his nose, it even has room for the air to get in for him to breath freely, we can make out the shape of his head, his coat is smooth and sleeky not back combed, we can see his paws and his tongue isn't hanging out. Don't tell me that anyone can work out if any show peek moves well coz you can't see their legs, back or neck for all that fur. Prince is superb by comparison end of its time the nonsense excuses ended and real action was taken for the benefit of the dogs

As someone who loves pugs, I personally don't think Malachy face is okay. Far from it. Pugs, bulldogs, and other extreme flat faced dogs need to have more muzzle. And better body structure to add at that.

But of course, the breeders who are breeding these particular dogs are breeding them into extinction. At this point, what will persuade them to improve the health of these breeds. I do not know. A miracle perhaps.

Some lovely pictures there Nymous. I particularly liked the "Three Beauties".

Some of those pictures were cigarette cards of old, much nicer than the diseased organs and necrotic limb pictures you see today in some countries.

It is odd, Pekingese were perfectly lovely little dogs in fact they looked almost identical to Tibetan spaniels.

Always seems to be the case a dog type is discovered in some far flung place brought back to the West completely changed and declared a breed with one type to a completely made up standard and closed registry.

I guess there might be perfectly charming healthier acceptable variable Pekingese types still found in Tibet today where the Chinese first found them before their journey to the West and transformation into the sad mess it is today in the show ring.

The ones I like are the gay little light athletic small headed smooth coat ones you see a lot of in the streets of Hong Kong, no documented pedigree. A lot like those old Pekes in fact.

I honestly think Prince is a much healthier alternative to Malachy but I still dont like the big headed flat look most have in the West. It might be difficult for birthing too.

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About Me

I grew up with pedigree dogs - English Setters, Great Danes, Labradors and, most recently, Flatcoated Retrievers. Today, I share my home with an assortment of dogs, purebred and mutts. In 2008, I directed Pedigree Dogs Exposed, a BBC documentary which uncovered the extent of health and welfare problems in pedigree dogs. The film has now been shown in more than 20 countries. Campaigning for improved purebred dog health is now a great passion - one fuelled by the fear that those who currently view themselves as the guardians of pedigree dogs are, often unwittingly, the agents of their demise.
My mission, then, is to continue to highlight where things have gone wrong and to encourage breeders and Kennel Clubs to embrace reform - particularly when it comes to harmful phenotypes and inbreeding.